The Proper Study of Mankind

This selection of the best of Berlin's essays seeks to represent the full range of his work. The opening sections include Berlin's defence of philosophy and history against assimilation to the methods of science; his seminal essays on liberty, which created the framework for subsequent discussion; and his exposition of his most distinctive doctrine - pluralism - which recognizes that equally good ultimate values may come into mortal conflict. These are followed by studies of Machiavelli, Vico and Herder, essays on Russian writers, and portraits of important contemporaries from Akhmatova and Pasternak to Churchill and Roosevelt. Thus this volume aims to encapsulate the principle movements that characterize the modern age.